My thoughts on the return of David Houghton to Derbyshire, as Head of Cricket, will have to wait until Saturday.
Reported last night on several news agencies, it will be the Zimbabwean's third stint at the club, following spells as coach and batting coach.
A full day today means I simply don't have the time to report on this in full and the first family holiday in three years where we are all together takes precedence.
Feel free to append your comments here, if you wish. If you prefer to wait until lthe main article appears that is fine!
I fully support this appointment
ReplyDeleteA highly respected Coach who has been working with Somerset and Middlesex in recent years
I am also pleased that J Wright will also support the county with recruitment and scouting
Harshly treated when removed with K.Krikken but now is the time to look forward and hopefully ensure he is fully supported in the role by the Committee and all commercial activities are used to underpin Dave's direction for 2019 and beyond
Good that DCCC have made the appointment before the end of the season, Dave Houghton can be planning and hopefully assess who he wants and pick up any released players he wants to add to the squad before other teams take everyone. I thought it was interesting that we have maintained the services of John Wright in some capacity, initially I thought it was just at the end of a phone, but it looks like he will be around the club during the summer. Hopefully this appointment will get away from the muddled thinking we have had for much of the season, e.g. early season openers, getting loan players in when trialist like Dal can't get a game.
ReplyDeleteSorry Peakfan, I can't get excited about us going back to somebody who has been here twice before. I hear people saying that DH knows the workings of the club. Based on the turmoil we seem to go through every now and then, i'm not sure that's a good thing. I also hear people talking about DH the coach. Problem is, he isn't coming as a coach, he's coming as head of cricket.
ReplyDeleteI have nothing against the bloke, and believe me, I wish him all the success in the world. If he is successful, then DCCC are successful, and let's be honest, that's all we want.
So despite my disappointment that we didn't go for somebody younger, with no previous DCCC connections, I welcome DH back to the club, and say to him, all the best.
The desion to get Houghton on board for the 3rd time did surprise me. I thought club would want a person who is not connected to the club and sell to supporters as new face new ideas. I personally think the club needed to somone totally new to the club.
ReplyDeleteI was hoping that John Wright would be assistant coach instead of advisory role (like Alan Donald at Kent). It does make sense having experience cricket heads steering our club and wish them both all the best.
The most important part of the winter has not come yet. I see what is bigger than Houghton/Wright is players extending their deal likes of Madsen, Critchley, Hughes, Hossian and Reece. If you look at Houghton last period in charge he didn’t have the quality of players we have now. He was working with very limited resorces at that time as coach.
My fears are the bigger clubs are now just cherry picking players from small counties. I am not sure if small clubs could put additional fees into contracts to make it hard to buy player out of there contact. They need to make a big payout to replace the player and putting clauses into contracts am not sure if this is possible. It's bad for the game as quality players wont be playing.